The Good, the Bad and the Doctor
by Blue Mistfall
Summary: The sequel to The Fangs, the Wands and the Sonic Screwdrivers. The Second Doctor loses something very important to him, and in order to restore it he decides to use some magic. Almost literally.


**A/N: GirlofScotland asked me to write a sequel. Thank you for support!**

* * *

Gossip appears with the speed of sound, spreads with the speed of light and dies with the speed of a comet. That's for sure. Just two or three months ago everyone - thanks to Evelyn Perigore - had been talking about the man who "must have turned Eugenie Stratton into a vampire", but this idea had been abandoned as soon as one sensible Twihard had noticed that Eugenie had had absolutely no "vampire syndromes", either "old" or "new". No fangs, no extraterrestrial beauty (though she wasn't too ugly, just a pretty teen), no pale cold skin, no eye color changes - nothing.

Nothing had promised something new coming instead.

* * *

Something flat and light, like an autumn leaf, flapped against Eugenie's ankle. But it was April! What autumn leaves could appear in April?.. The girl looked down and saw that it wasn't any leaf. It was a sheet of paper, crumpled, yellowish and with edges softer than the center. But this wasn't the strangest. It most probably was a page from a notebook: one edge of the sheet was more uneven than the rest, and it was covered with strangest combinations of circles, dots, lines and angles.

Eugenie turned the page over. The same patterns (though they all were different). It reminded her of Chinese hieroglyphs in the meaning of "weird pictures", but she doubted if such language even existed.

"I'd better keep this", she thought to herself. "Who knows..."

But there were news at school today. Totally, who had known!

"These are magic runes!" Jeannie Hiver exclaimed, producing the sheet with the same letters (or symbols, or hieroglyphs) like on Eugenie's. "I told you, Evelyn, if vampires exist, then wizards do too!"

"Prove it!" Evelyn snapped, but Eugenie gloatingly mentioned to herself that this main Twihard of the class got a bit tense upon having heard about her favourite subject. This had become inevitable since that fateful evening when she had truly met a vampire... at least she thought so, but Eugenie knew the truth. There had been no vampires, just a small bit of trickery. And influencing opinions.

"It's clear that wizards always use runes to write down their secret spells", Jeannie shot out. Meanwhile Eugenie noticed that over half of the class had such sheets on their desks. "Read any book about them!.. Oh, look, Eugenie's got one too!"

"I found it on the street", Eugenie immediately noticed. "Honestly. No one used incantations or something on me..."

But the tracks of the old gossip were here - everyone was staring at her, like at the main expert in the supernatural affairs. Except for the only kid who had the mind of his own. Lionel McAllister, who also had the "spell sheet". And his action a bit later, when no one was looking, was in his style, but highly unexpected for Eugenie - he simply gave his page to her and whispered:

"I'm sure that you know better how to use it".

* * *

Twirled this way or that, the writings on the pages weren't going to get deciphered, so Eugenie quickly abandoned the trials. Who could have lost them?.. Or perhaps thrown to the wind on purpose?.. For what? Those were nothing but paper and ink, so old that they had become parts of each other...

Eugenie attempted to concentrate on her homework, but the feeling of not revealed secret wasn't going to leave her. _No-no-no, Eugenie, do you remember what happened the previous time?_ - her inner voice asked. I do, she replied and bit the tip of her tongue, scribbling numbers in her notebook. Numbers, letters, signs... circular patterns... _Stop this, Eugenie!_ - the voice in her head ordered._ Do you have to get into stories?_

I don't get into stories, stories get me, Eugenie replied silently and let out a long sigh.

"Ahey, who's unsatisfied here?"

Eugenie found herself on the floor with her legs sticking in the air, having fallen back together with her chair, luckily without getting traumatized. She was home alone, and besides on the second floor, so no one possibly could have asked this. Unless... Having stood up, she revealed that the matter was exactly the one which passed in her head for a moment among all kinds of guesses.

A little man in shabby clothing was sitting on the windowsill, slightly grinning at her.

"What, didn't you foresee my visit?" he asked with mock offence. "It's not so easy to enter other houses like this".

"Doctor..." Yes, yes and yes, the previous "vampire" story had taken place with the influence - and later help - from this strange, strange little man. But still Eugenie felt some kind of warmth and trust upon his sight, thought questions were ready to get out of her mind one by one, not wishing to stand in turn and ready to mix up. "How..."

"Was trying out a soaring device", the Doctor explained, jumping onto the floor and showing a device similar to a hoverboard from Back to the Future. "Don't worry, this time the situation isn't as dangerous as the previous time. You see, I lost some very important notes from my five hundred year diary, and my TARDIS located them, but they all were locked in houses, so I couldn't just come in and fetch them".

"Then why did you come in here like a burglar?" Eugenie wondered.

"First: you know me. Second: you're home alone. Third: you believe me".

I do, Eugenie admitted to herself.

"Are those notes really that important?"

"Ooooh, my sweet, you have no idea what books can do! Some of them, after being read, can bring most powerful influence to this world!.. Can you help me?"

No way. I won't sleep tight if I don't do this, Eugenie thought and decided to bring it all out.

"I've got two pages. Are they the needed ones?" she asked, removing the pages (previously clipped over her writing desk) from the wall and giving them to the Doctor, whose blue eyes (this time they were not going to change color) shone like Bengal fires, which must have meant she was right. "I found one of them on the street, and the other was given to me by my friend. But the rest... I asked for them, no one would give them to me, though no one understands this language".

"No wonder", the Doctor muttered, producing his black leather book from his bottomless pocket and putting the missing pages inside.

"What's it called anyway?"

"Gallifreyan".

"Beautiful... but must be hell to read".

"Mm-hmm. And perfect for coding. No one will understand... So you say no one would give you the pages despite not understanding?"

Eugenie shrugged. The Doctor rubbed his chin in content.

"And what reasons do they have?"

"Dunno... Jeannie says that these are magic runes, and she's wizard-crazy..."

"First vampire freaks, now wizard freaks..." the Doctor mused, and then his expression turned to a cunning smirk. "I think I know how to kill two birds with one stone: get my pages and satisfy those who are crazy about magic. Sure there are more than Twiheads or whatever they are called... Listen up, Eugenie. If so, gossip around wizards coming to town everywhere you can".

"What?!"

"Gossip that you've seen a wizard, aka me", the Doctor went on in serious tone, though his eyes were alight. "Gossip about spells and wands and whatever which is fashionable in up-to-date magic world, you foul sneak... Get everyone who has my pages interested. And I'm going to prepare for the show".

At least that's not being thought to be a vampire's victim, Eugenie thought. And immediately spotted a big hole in the plan.

"What about the proofs?"

The Doctor had an answer for this: he pulled another notebook from his pocket and gave it to the girl. Having turned some blank pages over, Eugenie noticed there were loads more than standard one hundred and forty-four pages in it, though the cover suggested the contrary.

"This will be enough for the beginning", the Doctor assumed. "Endless notebook. No worries, that's just a bit of my trickery... There will be more added if there's interest. But first... a tiny bit of attracting attention, and then... and then..."

"How am I going to inform you about the results?"

"If it's all right, tomorrow you're going to find a blue police box in front of that haunted house, remember?" Heck yeah, Eugenie replied mentally. "Knock at its doors and see what happens next... Shave and a haircut?"

"Two bits!"

"Now you know the rhythm of knocking".

* * *

"I told you!" Jeannie was triumphantly ruffling through the pages of the endless notebook. "Well, Evelyn, and what will you say now?"

"I also found such notebook when encountering those vampires", Evelyn snapped. Yeah, that had been an encounter to remember, Eugenie thought and suppressed a giggle.

"Well, and how are you going to explain it from the vampire-fan point of view?" Kingsley Courtney wondered, having left Evelyn with no ways to escape. "It's here, and we see it".

"And it can't be explained from the rational point of view", Lionel added.

"Therefore it's magic!" Babs Anders interfered. "Who gave it to you, Eugenie?"

The addressed one began telling everything that got onto her tongue almost without filtrating it:

"See, Jeans was right. The pages which everyone collected are from a book written by a wizard. I bumped into him yesterday, and he said that if you return them to him, then..."

"You're lucky, Eugenie!" Jeannie exclaimed.

Yeah, totally lucky to get into stories, Eugenie thought.

"That's nonsense. Everyone knows there's no such thing as magic", Lionel objected, but the girl elbowed him in the ribs:

"Don't be a bore. Perhaps there is". After these words Eugenie thought to herself that she should ask the Doctor about the "rational explanation" of an ordinary notebook containing so many pages, and quickly forgot it.

* * *

Knock-knock, knock-knock-knock... What am I doing anyway? - Eugenie asked herself while waiting next to the old-fashioned blue police box that had appeared opposite her house, right next to the "haunted" one (which was perfectly normal now, no howling and hissing of the "ghosts"). But it was too late to surrender - she heard steps behind the blue doors. What? Steps? But you can hardly make one inside...

In a moment the door creaked open, and one blue eye peeked out:

"Two bits for entrance!"

Eugenie abandoned all her doubts as soon as she entered - they were replaced by astonishment and the feeling of wonder, because inside the tiny blue "shell" a completely new world was hidden, beginning with the futuristic vast room with greyish white walls and a huge glass column with something like a hexagonal table covered with levers, buttons and lights around it in the center. There were doors a bit farther, which suggested more space.

The Doctor pulled a lever on the "table", and the entrance doors closed behind Eugenie.

"It's almost the same like with the notebook. Dimensional transcendentalism. Absurd, but works".

The door opposite to the entrance slightly opened, and a dark-haired head popped from behind it:

"Who's there, Doctor? Ah... hey".

"Remember Eugenie, Jamie?"

"How can't I?" Jamie replied, fully entering the room. "Vampires and superstitions..."

"She agreed to help me find my notes, but we all are going to be involved. I hope you don't mind..."

That was familiar. Like a little guilty boy in a grown-up's body, Eugenie thought - the expression which appeared on the Doctor's all-time changeable face couldn't be described more exactly.

"I don't", Jamie beamed. "Pretending to be a vampire was loads of fun".

"As well as watching it", the girl's voice followed, and its owner entered the room as well. "Oooh, hello!"

Eugenie made a shy greeting gesture, now feeling incredibly dimwitted - and she didn't know why. The Doctor hurried to explain the situation to his friends:

"That time we made a performance with vampires, and this time we'll have to do it as wizards. And I don't think that a wizard with just one helper is going to gain success..."

"What do you mean?" Victoria asked.

"I mean that we're going to give a small show. I'll be the wizard, while you two... In all, my pages will serve as entrance tickets".

"And where are we going to do it?" Jamie asked. The Doctor gave him an intense stare. "You want to say..."

"If we do it, then we do it persuasively. We're just going to... Eugenie?"

"Hm?"

"Will you help us? I mean, background help. It's always needed".

"Fine. If you teach me".

* * *

The trick with one-side seeing worked not only with glass. The Doctor had created something like a long corridor from the TARDIS entrance to the room in which the "performance" was to take place, and it had a secret. From its inside, its walls, ceiling and floor seemed completely black with little lights there and here, but from the other side everything taking place in the tunnel was seen, so Eugenie could follow the ones in the corridor, not fearing to be noticed.

But the matter with outfits appeared to be more complicated.

"I'm stuck! What if that... garment remains on me forever?!"

"Trust me, I don't feel better about it either..."

That was the first what Eugenie heard from the wardrobe room - and the next thing she heard was her own squeal of horror: a flock of bats flew over her head and directly into the place full of all kinds of clothes.

"Don't worry", the Doctor noticed, having emerged after this flock was completely in the wardrobe room. "Those are just TARDIS library bats. Good friends of mine, they are. And they are going to help us too... Jamie! My word, you look like a perfect shadow!"

"I feel like a perfect fool..." Jamie muttered, coming from behind the "curtain" made of various clothing. At first Eugenie didn't even believe that it was him: his usual shirt and kilt were replaced by skin-tight cover of shimmering black cloth, enveloping him from feet to neck, and the upper half of his face was covered with a sharp-edged mask. "How people move in such clothing?.."

Victoria was the next to show herself. Her clothing was a white catsuit, over which thinnest layers of see-through cloth were flying, creating some kind of an unearthly nimbus around her. And, judging by her movements, she neither was used to this kind of clothing.

"Don't worry, you'll soon get used", the Doctor reassured them. "Walk for a while... How do you like them, Eugenie?"

Eugenie only managed to make a not too sure "emmmm..." as an answer, for she still wasn't getting the "roles".

"There will be The Good", the Doctor gestured at Victoria, "The Bad", the same gesture at Jamie, "and... you know. I'll tell you the details when I check one little trick".

"And why bats are needed?" Eugenie asked.

"You'll see..."

* * *

"It's not going to work", Lionel repeated while following the group consisting of his classmates and their friends (most of the kids here had met each other just today, and there were not less than thirty youngsters here). "You all know there's no such thing as magic".

"Prove it, dry-brain!" Jeannie teased. "You gotta spoil all the fun again, eh?" She checked the directions in her phone (which had appeared there in the morning, as well as it had taken place with everyone else's phones, but not via a message - they had been written in the "notes", and they couldn't be sent, just entered into the phone, and everybody knew that no one unfamiliar had touched their phones). "Seems it's here".

"But there's nothing here, only an old police box", Manny Sand noticed.

"Doesn't that mean we should look what's inside?" Jeannie asked, causing everyone to agree in different way. "Surely, someone should be hiding there".

The box's doors, as if responding to her words, began slowly opening, showing complete darkness inside instead of expected locked space. But what was the most puzzling about it? As soon as Alan Meyers, the accepted daredevil, reached out to it, his hand was gone in the darkness, as if he put it into black liquid.

"Explain that, McDullister", Babs smirked at him, and the teens one by one began entering the mysterious box. They didn't bump into the opposite wall of it, but the side walls were there to lead their way, and they were on longer distance from each other than the side walls of the booth. And there could be no words about any kind of underground shelter: the kids knew the place where this box had appeared perfectly well, and if there had been something hidden, they would've known... and you can't make an underground shelter in one night.

Soon all company was inside the dark tunnel, almost not lighted except for teeny tiny sparkles in the ceiling, as if they were in the "tubed outer space". Almost complete darkness, and the lights from the cell phones didn't help at all.

"It's creepy here", somebody whispered.

"Pay no attention", Jeannie replied.

"Hellooooooo!"

Everybody's hearts skipped a beat because no one waited for the new voice to call out. It was impossible to recognize from where it came - from right, from left, from the top, it was filling the whole tunnel, echoing in more "greetings".

"Hellooooooooo!" the new voice called out once again. "Are you there? I heard someone enter!"

"We're here!"

As soon as Jeannie called this out, a bright flash blinded everybody for a moment (no wonder, after such darkness!), having lighted someone that was also present here - or wasn't? No one heard any steps or could find anyone "extra" in the crowd.

"What did you see?" Babs asked.

"That was a man", Kiki Trotter replied, having set the chain of details due to "collective memory" - everyone memorized just one detail. The following was said by all voices at once.

"Ugly".

"Not ugly, just an elder".

"Not old. Black hair".

"And old-fashioned hairstyle".

"Wrinkled".

"Sharp-nosed".

"Wearing a cloak".

"Grinning".

"Wizard hat".

What a fine collection, Lionel thought to himself and covered his eyes with his palm: a small light flashed again, but this time it stayed steady. When everyone's sight became adjusted to the new source of light, they saw that it was produced by the tip of a long slender wand held in the air by a right hand... and nothing more. This hand was soaring in the air, not attached to arm and everything else, like a flying copy of Thing from The Addams Family.

"There's an invisible man here", Manny gasped.

"Then he's fleshless as well", Babs mumbled - the hand with the wand continued hovering over their heads until the light touched everybody's faces. Lionel could've sworn that this hand was plastic or anything (these things were pretty convincing) if he hadn't caught the warmth produced by it when it had soared past him. No doubt, that was a living man's hand, and it was in such position as if its owner was walking among them... It suddenly tossed the wand into the air, and guess by whom it was caught.

"Evelyn!" Jeannie exclaimed. "I didn't know you were interested in magic!"

"I'm interested in proving that you're all wrong", Evelyn snapped, twirling the still lighting wand in her fingers. No way. Simple wood without any batteries or lamps or any up-to-date stuff, but still its tip was shining, as if a star was set on it. "Magic - does - not - exist..."

All of sudden a small blow of wind rushed towards them. Where would it come from in here? Evelyn lighted the tunnel as far as she could with the wand, but there was another riddle to solve. The walls of the corridor didn't seem solid at sight - the light couldn't make them become closely visible, as if they were made of flexible glass and there was truly darkest night behind them.

Wind kicked in the kids' faces again, and then someone - most probably, Babs - yelled with horror: the light beam from the wand showed another thing, particularly the fact where the hand went. Now it was sitting on the ginger head of Benna Shane (who didn't realize it before Babs's "warning") and lost no time: as soon as it was spotted, it jumped off her head, soaring in the air again.

The kids, dumbfounded, watched as it approached to Evelyn, shook its forefinger at her, grabbed the wand back and vanished.

"Come on..." Jeannie called, not too sure about if it was a good idea.

* * *

Eugenie thought that her chest was about to crack in two - so hard she struggled to keep her laughter in. Poor Benna! And poor Evelyn trying to decipher the wand's secret...

"Can't you hold it inside?" Jamie whispered to her - they were standing at the other side of the tunnel's wall, watching the process. Don't you pretend, I can see that you're about to burst out laughing too, Eugenie replied in her thoughts. The main for you is to keep a straight face while in action, and it's gonna be soon...

"I'm going to EXPLODE!" Eugenie whisper-yelled, having caught a moment when everyone was too distracted to notice any extra sounds. "How did he do that anyway?"

"Let's ask him later... he never explains thing before they are finished... Oh-oh-oh, they're going on. My turn!"

"As we rehearsed?"

"As we rehearsed".

* * *

The light was gone, and the teens found themselves in the complete darkness again.

"I got blind!" someone shrieked.

"The light's off, Tori!" Evelyn snapped.

"Light's off, and I got blind!" Tori replied. But the following comment wasn't made by any of the kinds, but by somebody else. Low, slightly hissing voice filled the tunnel:

"Why are you sssstanding there?.. Are you afraid?.."

The teens instinctively began searching for hands to hold, and someone burst out hysterically cackling.

"No one got blind, that's jusssst me", the voice continued. "I know that your mindssss are corrupted by technological meanssss, but ssssometimesss you gotta believe that ssssomebody elssse isss pressssent too..."

"Who's there?" Lionel called out.

"Guessss..."

The next moment the tunnel was filled with yelps of surprise and fear, as well as flapping of wings against everything.

"Bats!" Manny exclaimed, twirling around in trials to find anybody around him.

"Vampire bats!" Evelyn shot out, feeling her forehead cover with cold sweat.

"Only vampires in your head!" Babs gasped.

"I think we gotta get going, we got stuck!" Jeannie called out, and the flying beasts were gone in a fingers' snap. The mysterious voice sounded again:

"Right. Go on, you got sssstuck. I'm waiting".

* * *

"There's a nice push you've given the process, Jamie", the Doctor noticed - he joined Eugenie behind the wall, watching (before he had been at the different side of the tunnel, fiddling with some weird gears). And now he was dressed in a dark blue suit with a black cloak over it and wide-brimmed wizard hat - a mixture of old and new styles of "magic fashion". "I didn't even expect you to be so convincing".

"It's easy to be convincing when no one sees you", Jamie admitted. Truly, this black "second skin" had made him completely and utterly invisible in the tunnel, and it would have worked even if there had been any light. The only patches left without cover were his fingers and the bottom half of his face. "But this skinny suit... yow, it seems that it gotta rip on me any moment".

"You're just... not... used". Eugenie finally coped with her soundless laughter attack (she had been rolling on the floor simply not to make it loud) and stood up, gasping for air. "While they're wandering on... Doctor, how did you do that thing with your hand?"

"It was some kind of an advanced 3-D projection", the Doctor explained. "Usually projections have only visual parameter, while this one has all of them. Smell, touch, solidity - everything. When I first showed myself there - remember, in that flash? - I dropped the wand on purpose. Then I went out of the tunnel and sent my hand there. It works as if it really was there, which means I could feel my virtual hand's touching objects. The most complicated part is not to get confused with distance, and the rest is trifles. How did you like the trick with bats?"

"Bet their hearts nearly bounced out together with something else!" Eugenie approved.

"Well, we're just getting started. Now be a good girl and check that they're not going to come back..." The Doctor chuckled in a classical tone of an evil genius.

* * *

Some of the kids decided to turn back and run away from all those potential horrors that were waiting for them, but hardly had they reached the "start point" when they realized there was no way back - it had divided in two in some unknown way. And both ways were blocked.

"I'm scared", Benna admitted.

"You're not alone", Casper Shackle whispered. "If I believed in magic, I would've thought that this place is alive and it doesn't want us to be cowards..."

"You don't have to believe in magic to assume that some places have special atmosphere", Lionel's voice was heard. "C'mon. Why are you standing there like wooden?"

Benna suddenly yelled in horror, grabbing Lionel's shoulders like a drowning one does to the rescuer. Three more voices joined her in a moment, so Lionel, who seemed to be the only one missing everything (what was that thing that made them react so? They couldn't see anything anyway), freed himself from Benna's grasp, turned around... and suppressed a cry of terror for the first time in his life: a pair of glowing eyes was staring at them from the darkness. Lionel's first thought was that those were the eyes of some big cat (which, as known, can also be set aglow in darkness), but then it should've been a damn large cat because those eyes were at higher level than theirs.

"Decided to avoid meeting the inevitable?" the voice that had called for them earlier asked. "Tut, tut. That's no good at all". Then another flash of light appeared in the tunnel, blinding the teens again and then showing the face of the speaker. No doubt. This very man had showed himself for a moment before. Not too tall, dressed in a suit with cloak and a wide-brimmed wizard hat, and in all he wasn't really a beauty: thick black fringe was seen from under the hat, his face already had age wrinkles (it especially referred to skin folds near his sharp nose), and in all he would have looked almost ordinary if it were not for his eyes - they were even more aglow in the beam of light than in darkness, again just like cat's eyes.

"And who are you? How did you do that your eyes burn?" Benna blabbed out, seemingly not realizing what she was talking about.

"Just call me... the Doctor. And would it be interesting if I told you everything?" The man gave them a cunning grin. "Now there's a riddle for you. What can dissolve darkness?"

"Light", Lionel replied for everybody here.

"So stop dilly-dallying and find it here!" The Doctor blew at the tip of his wand, and the "star" on its tip was gone, leaving them in complete darkness again.

"He's gone!" Casper shot out after having rushed to the place where the man had stood. The poor lighting from the cell phone screens approved that they were alone again. He couldn't have escaped so quickly, and there should've been sounds of steps at least!.. Even Lionel began feeling twinges of suspect inside.

* * *

Finally the dark tunnel led the gang to the... outside? No. This place was more like a temple of an unknown culture. Its dome-like carved ceiling was higher than any average ceiling, and there were holes in it showing the sky covered with rain clouds on the outside. Stone columns were surrounding the vast hall, and the walls... and the most curious was about the walls between those columns. They weren't made of stone, or metal, or any sensible material. They consisted of white and golden glimmering mist which stayed in motion all the time, creating the most bizarre images which stayed for just a moment.

The entrance to the tunnel was also covered with this sparkling mist as soon as the last teen entered the hall, so now it couldn't be recognized among the rest.

"Where are we?" Babs asked.

"Perhaps in some hidden place. Just like Hogwarts", Jeannie replied, having made Evelyn sniff. "Remember? It was said in the books that it can't be found on maps".

"This place can't be found on maps of our town for sure..." Manny muttered and was ready to say something else, but was interfered by a yelp. Squeaky Benna! But the next moment all girls (and some of the boys too) shouted out loud upon having seen bats flying right towards them from all corners of the hall. And, despite all the expectations (bad or worse), they were not going to attack - they were stopping in some inches from the kids and flying back, as if telling them to step back. When there was a free patch, the bats formed one flock and were gone, replaced by a human figure crouched and curled on the floor.

"Hello again", the figure spoke, standing up and slightly smiling in a cunning manner. It revealed to be a young man, if to judge by his voice and his figure shown out by his skin-tight black outfit. The upper half of his face was covered with a dark mask with sharp edges. "Was the tunnel scary?"

"It's him", Tori whispered. "He turned into bats in the tunnel!"

"Don't tell me nonsense, Tori". Evelyn stepped forward to act. "Stop that pretending to be a super-anti-hero! I know who you are!"

"Oh, really?" The "black kid's" brown eyes widened through the holes in his mask. Yes, this had been his voice ringing through the walls of the tunnel when the bats had attacked, though now it didn't have that sinister hissing in it.

"Yes, I do!" Evelyn snapped. "You're nothing of the magic kind, because magic does not exist! You are a vampire!"

"Just because of the bats, hmm?" the youngster smirked.

"Still it's useless to pretend. Your name is Jamie, and admit it!"

"I do", the youngster replied cheerfully. "Even unearthly beings have names, and they're not as exotic as you imagine. For instance... the Doctor".

"That's not a name at all", Evelyn snapped. "And in all - stop that pretending, admit that you're a vampire and..."

"My pleasure!"

The next moment Jamie was gone, having literally fallen apart into the flock of bats that surrounded Evelyn from all sides, not only keeping her away from the rest, but also not letting the teens who rushed to help her come closer. Then the flock (together with its screaming victim) soared upwards, to the platform on the top of the farther column, placed her there and - oh goodness, joined into Jamie without landing on the floor. Some of the kids actually rubbed their eyes in disbelief, but there, over their heads, now was a young man soaring as easily as a feather in an updraft. No threads, no ropes, no technical devices - they just couldn't be hidden in such kind of clothing...

"And stay here until you learn proper manners and listening not only to your opinion", Jamie noticed, shaking his forefinger at dumbfounded Evelyn, who only nodded, her over-made-up eyes occupying three quarters of her face instead of usual half and her bottom jaw dropped. This was something that she couldn't explain, as well as what happened next.

A strong blow of wind - wind? - rushed through the air again, bringing something new.

"Look!" Benna exclaimed, pointing at one of the arcs filled with white and golden sparkles - white rose petals were rushing out of it, carried by the wind. All without any scratch or yellow edge, perfectly fresh, and gathering into another figure, opposite to the first in all senses. It was a young girl in clothing consisting of hair-thin layers of white and see-through material, and the impression was as if she was wearing a silver cloud. The only dark accents in her groove was her long thick hair loose over her shoulders and her eyes seen through the holes in her white mask.

"Don't you think she deserves another chance?" she asked. Poor Evelyn was only switching her glance from Jamie onto her and back, while the rest of the kids felt as if their feet were wooden, making them stand on one place instead of running. Someone - Benna, for instance - regretted about coming here for one hundred and first time.

"I don't, Victoria", Jamie replied, having performed two or three somersaults in the air, and chose the position of "sitting" on the invisible bench (which wasn't there, of course). "This girl made me annoyed when I showed her what I can do the previous time. So what? My abilities have grown since then, but I'm still not a vampire".

"But... who are you two, then?" Lionel was the first to step out of the crowd and ask this. To Jeannie's (and someone else's) delight, he was sincerely amazed, which happened to him rarely. "You... dissolve and then appear, and... I've studied such tricks, but yours are nothing of the kind. No special stunts, it just... takes place".

"Is it interesting to know everything from the very beginning? Spoilers".

No one quite caught when this man in an indigo suit and black cloak together with wide-brimmed wizard's hat appeared in the hall, but Lionel, Benna and Casper recognized him at once.

"Doctor!" the last two shot out.

"Right", the man beamed. Now his eyes weren't aglow - just normal human eyes of strong blue color. "Well, you were told that you'll be let in only if you have the pages. And I see that you do". He produced a book in black leather cover. "I'll tell you a secret: these sheets contain very special kind of information, the one that you can find only if you know where to search for it..."

He made a quick gesture with his other hand which hand a wand in it, and unexpectedly all the pages folded in pockets, hidden in books and bags darted out of their shelters, having made their "keepers" shriek and grab their "containers", and guess where they were heading. That's right, into the now-opened book, immediately growing back to their proper places.

"See, Lionel?" Jeannie whispered. "Find an explanation for this..."

"Jeannie..." The Doctor approached to her, while Jamie and Victoria stayed at the sides of the column with Evelyn on top. "You seem to be the most eager believer here. Say, why?"

"B-because... t-there are many things that cannot be explained", Jeannie replied, fruitlessly trying to hide her worry, if not fear. It always happens this way: you think that you're ready to meet something, especially the unknown, and when you do...

"Like what? Anyone else cares to answer?" the Doctor addressed this to the crowd. Manny was the first to dare:

"Weren't those your... charges... flying here? How did they do that?"

"And who are they, anyway?" Babs wondered.

"Every character of history has at least two names: the one with which he or she was born and the one given after some achievements", the Doctor replied, even slyer grin dancing on his lips. "Victoria and Jamie, the Good and the Bad, halves of each and every living being... Right, Manny, you wanted to know? Say the magic words".

"Which... magic words?"

"Any magic words that will surely make you fly like they did".

Jeannie lost no time in shooting out the well-known words, pointing at Manny with her forefinger as if it was a wand:

"Wingardium Leviosa!"

And, to everyone's awe, Manny's feet tore off the floor, and he waved his arms from side to side, trying to remain in vertical position, which wasn't easy because he was floating higher and higher, to the ceiling of the "temple". Almost two dozen of eyes stared at him from the below - they knew that there were no secrets about Manny, so how?.. Just - how?..

The Doctor twirled his wand in his fingers:

"Anyone else wants to feel like a fairy?"

* * *

Eugenie was twirling under the ceiling of the TARDIS console room, laughing. She had never imagined that this "superhero" hovering could ever occur to her, and that this "performance" had worked. There had been many tricks, apart from the "flight" one. Vanishing and reappearing things. Moving statues. Creating rain in locked space. Suns, moons and planets appearing from thin air...

"Eugenie!"

The girl, now hanging upside down, turned to see the Doctor returning to the console room.

"Come down, you're not going to soar there forever, this can come out of control!" he called out, and Eugenie made swimming moves to get to him. Really, now she wanted to have a little walk. "Thank you for all the names".

"No problem. I won't ask you about everything..." Eugenie started, gasped when her feet touched the floor again, and went on: "...but... how did you make my mates fly?"

"As well as I made Jamie and Victoria do this", the Doctor replied, moved his palm over Eugenie's sleeve and showed that it was now covered with hardly seen silver dust. "See? Anti-gravity nanobots. Using natural kinetic energy and pushing the carrier upwards with it... It's complex, but the basic principle is this. While the kids were in the tunnel, Jamie and the library bats helped to spread the nanobots over them without any problem... and then I just activated them with this". He showed his "wand" (which surely contained some kind of supercool future device, Eugenie thought). "As about vanishing and appearing trick - you already know that. Perception filter and bats or petals hidden in tiny bags which are bigger on the inside... Anyway, I got my 500 year diary pages back, all of them, and that's the main".

"That was all quite a show, but I don't like flying..." Jamie entered the room, his legs wobbling under him - the word "flying" drowned in the attack of his feeling sick.

"Oh crumbs..."


End file.
